The Freedom of the Undergraduate R ECENT unhappy events at Cambridge
have received sufficient, in fact too much, publicity. With the affair itself we are not here concerned, except to express our sympathy with the relatives of the victims. It is impossible and probably undesirable to apportion exactly the blame for the tragedy. It is obviously wrong to throw all the blame for the behaviour of an abnormal individual upon the system which failed to prevent his behaving abnormally, as the popular Press has been trying to do. The connexion of the particular event with the question of the liberty of the undergraduate is fortuitous, and arises from the sensation-mongering habits of that Press. The undergraduate who proceeds by a gradually descending road of guilt from- champagne breakfasts to murder never existed outside the tracts of our ancestors until he was resurrected in the columns of the Sunday Express.
Nevertheless the question has been asked, whether it is desirable that such eccentricities and peccadilloes as occur at our older universities should continue unchecked, and although it is obvious that they cannot, as is suggested, of themselves lead to a career of crime, the question has not been answered. The coroner at the inquest suggested that the university authorities would tighten up their regulations to prevent the expeditions by motor car and other irregularities which have been disclosed during the inquiry, and the daily papers have " featured " stories of undergraduate recklessness. However unfor- tunate it may be that these charges should have been made in connexion with the recent tragedy, they remain to be answered. It is particularly important to answer them because at the moment many other universities are trying to give their members the undoubted advantages which go with the residential system in force at Oxford and Cambridge.
We may say at once that we think there is legitimate cause of complaint. Undoubtedly at each of the older universities there are, as in every gathering of young men, some whose careers are a credit neither to themselves, their parents, nor to the university and college to which they belong. The blame, of course, does not lie entirely with any one of these. It may be the fault of the homes from which the undergraduates come, of the inflated credit system exploited by the university tradesmen, of the weak human nature of the undergraduates them- selves, which would be equally obvious wherever these individuals happened to be, or of the authorities who fail to control them, or, as is probably the fact, of all of them in varying degrees.
It is, however, with the part of the authorities that we are concerned. They are urged to tighten their regu- lations, to allow no more of the " joy riding " and extrava- gance which are now posSible, to enforce-their regulations, to prevent irregular absence from the university, in fact to increase the resemblance of the university to a rather freer public school. It should be obvious that such an attempt would be foredoomed to failure. You cannot- by anything short of a military system of discipline control every movement of a young man of from eighteen to twenty-five, and prevent his every indiscretion. The university authorities are already making every effort to enforce their regulations, yet it is said that where there is any desire to evade them, they are evaded with success and impunity. It may even, we should think, have occurred to the authorities that to take any further steps in this direction would provoke the very desire for evasion which defeats them at present. Even their present efforts make them ridiculous in the eyes of many under- graduates, for everybody who has been- at the university knows that it is often the innocent who suffer. The thoughtful youth, whose quiet walk has taken him longer than he expected, will be fined for being without his gown at night, whereas the one who has made his plans to spend his evenings regularly at a dancing hall in London or twenty miles away goes free and boasts of his impunity. There are, of course, a large majority of undergraduates who are as hard working and quiet as could be wished. But when the law can be evaded with impunity the law is brought into contempt.
Moreover, there is something of the same situation at the universities, as may be found in America under Prohibition. Many of the statutes are, in fact, old- fashioned restrictions on the liberty of any responsible young man, and the perception that they are so, coupled with the fact that they are not enforced, brings the whole system of regulations into contempt. There is only one penalty which is effective with some of the offenders, and that is temporary or permanent banishment from the university, and the authorities quite rightly hesitate to apply this in cases that are not essentially serious.
Our contention is that where this is so—where, in fact, the technical breach of regulations is not proof of an unfitness for the society of a university—the authorities of the universities need not enforce penalties, for the attempt to do so would only render them ridiculous. On the other hand we think that the standard of fitness for this society should be steadily raised, and that where individuals do not come up to this standard, whether or not there has been any technical offence, the penalty of banishment should be applied more ruthlessly than at present. Surely in such a society, if anywhere, it should be possible to avoid the ineptitudes and clumsy rigidity of an ordinary legal system. We think that the attempt to do so, and to apply to this society the standards of self- respect in a common purpose, the only penalty for failure being exclusion from the community which follows that purpose, would earn for the universities a new lease, not of life, for that is not in danger, but of reputation and of, leadership.
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